---
title: Custom Categories
description: 'Enhance your product experience by adding custom categories tailored to your needs'
---

## How to set custom categories?

Users can now create custom categories tailored to their specific needs, in addition to the default categories such as travel, sports, music, and more. When custom categories are provided, they will override the default categories.
To setup the custom categories, user has to specify the category name and a description of what that category signifies.
Here’s how you can do it:

```python
from mem0 import MemoryClient

m = MemoryClient(api_key="xxx")

custom_categories = [
    {"cooking": "For users interested in cooking, including recipes, cooking tips, and culinary experiences."},
    {"fitness": "Includes content related to fitness, such as workouts, exercises, and fitness tips."}
]

messages = [
    {"role" : "user", "content" : "Hi, my name is Alice. I love to play badminton."},
    {"role" : "assistant", "content" : "Hello Alice! It's nice to meet you. Badminton is such an amazing sport. How can I assist you today?"},
    {"role" : "user", "content" : "I am a fitness freak, I go to gym daily."},
    {"role" : "assistant", "content" : "That's great! Regular exercise is very beneficial for health."},
    {"role" : "user", "content" : "Because of my gym plan, I mostly cook at home."},
    {"role" : "assistant", "content" : "Cooking at home is a good way to ensure you have a balanced diet."}
]
```

<CodeGroup>
```python Code
client.add(messages, user_id="alice", custom_categories=custom_categories)
```

```markdown Memories with categories
User's name is Alice (personal_details)
Loves playing badminton (sports)
User is a fitness freak. (fitness)
Likes to go to gym daily. (fitness)
Mostly cook at home because of gym plan. (fitness, cooking)
```
</CodeGroup>

<Note> The more detailed the description of categories is, the better output the user will receive. When custom categories are provided in the `add` API call, they will completely replace the default categories and will be directly assigned to the memory, so make sure to include all categories you want to use. </Note>

<Note> We will soon release a feature that allows users to set custom categories in `project`. This will allow the functionality where relevant categories are automatically assigned to the memory based on the input text provided. </Note>

## Default Categories
Here is the list of **default categories**. Ensure you review these before creating custom categories to prevent duplication.

```
- personal_details
- family
- professional_details
- sports
- travel 
- food
- music
- health
- technology
- hobbies
- fashion
- entertainment
- milestones
- user_preferences
- misc
```

If you have any questions, please feel free to reach out to us using one of the following methods:

<Snippet file="get-help.mdx" />